The Battle of the Somme Essay -- Papers

The engagement of the Somme The Battle of the Somme involved the main allied attack on the horse opera Front in the 1st World War. It is mainly famous collect to the loss of 58,000 British troops on the first day of conflict (1st July 1916). The attack ran from 1st July until 18th November and was located upon a 30-kilometre front, from North of the Somme River betwixt Arras and Albert. The offensive was planned earlier in 1915 and was intended to be a joint Franco-Anglo attack. The French Commander in Chief, Joffre, said that the count on was to drain the German forces of reserves, however territorial gain also had close to input. Sir Douglas Haig was the Commander in Chief of the BEF who would be conducting the major offensive in 1916. Originally, although the British forces made up the bulk of the offensive forces, the attack was to be predominantly French. However the German siege on battle of Verdun at the beginning of 1916 turn outed in the diversion of almost all-French manpower and efforts as Falkenhayn had promised to run France white. This changed the intent of the Somme attack and the French ordered the planned date (1st dread 1916) to be bought forward to 1st July, the aim now to eliminate the Germans from Verdun to the defence of the Somme. Haig now had no choice but to take surge of the attack in Joffres absence. He used both the ideas of himself and those of General Rawlinson. On Saturday 24th June the attack proceeded by an eight-day preliminary bombardment on the German lines. The expectation being that all forward German defences would be destroyed leaving the at... ...Battle of the Ancre where the field fortress of Beaumont Hamel was captured. The British were finally progressing, but level(p) this was bought to a halt when extremely bad weather caused the Somme offensive to end. The resu lt had been an estimated 420,000 British casualties, a further 200,000 for the French and around 500,000 for the Germans and all for nevertheless 12 kilometres of land in Britain and Frances favour. Over 1 million lives were confused in this battle alone and all the Somme offensive was designed for was to divert German attention from the French at Verdun. Some believe this battle acted as a learning curve in the employment of artillery, which contributed to the success in 1918. In my opinion it shows the severity and pointlessness of war. Hardly anything was achieved aside from the loss of thousands of lives.